Twitter to open office in social network-crazed Brazil

SAO PAULO (REUTERS) - Without even setting foot in Brazil, Twitter attracted 40 million subscribers in this social network-obsessed nation.

Now the United States (US) company is planning to open an office in Sao Paulo to cash in on that growth in a bustling market where rival Facebook has already set up shop.

"We believe our new office in Brazil will allow us to get closer to the users and show the value of our platform," the company's new country manager for Brazil, Mr Guilherme Ribenboim, told Reuters in a recent interview.

"Brazil has rather mature Internet and advertisement markets. Our audience is very big and active," he said. "We are going to try to monetize it." Brazil is already Twitter's second-biggest market after the US in terms of accounts and ranks fifth by usage, ac cording to the Paris-based market intelligence firm Semiocast.